Listen: Firewall & Iceberg Podcast No. 98

It's time for the season's final "Breaking Bad"-centric installment of The Firewall & Iceberg podcast.

Sniffle.

Starting next week, the podcast will cease to have any kind of reliable structure.

It's a tragedy, really.

So expect plenty of "Breaking Bad" finale talk, but first we've got a slew of reviews including looks at the new seasons of "Bored to Dead" and "The Walking Dead," plus random conversations about early cancellations and our favorite recent "Simpsons" episodes.

A long-time member of the TCA Board and a longer-time blogger of "American Idol," Dan Fienberg writes about TV, except for when he writes about movies or sometimes writes about the Red Sox. But never music. He would sound stupid talking about music.

I thought I liked season 3 just slightly moore, until I saw the screen shot from Gales apartment from the opening scene of this season that had a skull on a shelf that looks just like Gus, and thats when season 4 became my favorite.

If you wow them in the end, they, the audience, will forget what came before? I expect a lot of show introductions to include flashbacks. The fact that the writers held back on Mike, signifies that he will play an important in the relationship between Jesse and Walt. If Jesse finds out about Jane/Brock it is going to be through Mike? Recall, Mike has a way with Saul, even though Saul gave Mike misleading information about the whereabouts of Jesse in season 3. Season 3 is the pinnacle in this series--it was an orchestral movement from beginning to end. A lot of entertaining and amazing things were done in season 4, but in terms of Narrative Thread and everything that goes into making mini-films for television, season 3 was better. I would like to reference camera movement continues to be consistent--nervous and tensioned riddled observer.

Since the finale of season 4 was a strong episode, and I especially appreciated was the camera movement from Gus's left side to his right, and final pan from Walter's backyard, same camera movement revealing the monster(s) buried beneath the surface.

The way this show is structured any scenario would have been credible. How does Walt die? Why didn't Walt kill Jesse when he had the chance at the lab? Hank? I agree with you both that this will not appease Hank. I also feel that Hank was purposely hidden during the course of this season.

Believe me when I tell that everything else on the telly feels FLAT to me after Breaking Bad.

I don't even care AMC is will to drag the last 16 episodes for two years, just as long as they don't change their minds. That is, unless they do the same with the Sopranos and extent the show, but I seriously doubt it.

Ok, let me change that. Because yeah, I can totally see why people think he should kill him, but none of these people seem for realize that Walt really does care for Jesse. Remember the first time we met Heisenberg was when Tuco put Jesse in the hospital. He has just shown he cares for him too many time, that if he all of a sudden killed him, it would kind of ruin all those scenes for me.

That’s not so say something can come in the last 16 episodes that will change all that, I fully expect some Walt Vs Jesse storylines..I just don’t know how they are going to top the fight scene and the confrontation scene from this season.

Re the change in story telling structure I'm very firmly in the Dan camp that while I enjoyed the finale very much the kid poisoning is a big cheat. What I have a question about is that Alan's always stated Tony Soprano didn't die because that would have been such a dramatic change in style yet he seems to applaud BB for it?

Write a comment...Thank you, thank you, thank you for taking the Simpsons seriously! It's still funny and well made...and even a bad episode is way better than "How to be a Gentleman" could wish to be.

Thank you, thank you, thank you for taking the Simpsons seriously! It's still funny and well made...and even a bad episode is way better than "How to be a Gentleman" could wish to be. Write a comment...

Walt isn't completely "evil". Walt is a brilliant chemist and he knows it. I'm sure that he "knows" that with the amount of toxin that he used, a child of Brock's age and size wouldn't be in mortal danger. That being said, I just think that the whole set up was pretty ridiculous and Gus ended up being not much more than a Bond villain; but then, so were Tuco and the Cousins. I still very much like the show, but it doesn't seem nearly as important as it did after the first season.

Ed - I *want* to like "Revenge" and I'm still watching it in the hopes that I might eventually get hooked. But maybe it's Emily Van Camp or maybe it's the assortment of boring pretty boys or maybe it's the emphasis on hair/costume over character, but I'm not there yet... Fortunately, it's in a time slot where I can give it plenty of patience...

I agree about the pretty-boy issue and hair/costume but that's equally true with Secret Circle and Hart of Dixie. Ultimately I think Revenge's biggest problem (other than the ABC mandated voice over endings) is that it is moving too fast and making things too easy for Emily. It needs to be more of a slow burn and have longer buildups over multiple episodes.

But it's new, and I have hope it will work out the kinks. It gets points from me for not being another doctor, cop, lawyer show.

Speculating on what will happen with Breaking Bad in the next 16 episodes is really interesting. I think it becomes exceptionally difficult for Walter to keep his identity as Heisenberg secret. I wouldn't be surprised if mid-way, Walter builds-up a base outside of the normal suburban context - like in Mexico similar to a cartel chief.

First, we know from the news that cartels are much larger than the group Gus killed off, so there will be others stepping into to over the cartels. The new cartel shot callers won't have any natural reason to fight with Walter. Walter will need a cartel to sell any future meth production. So, that sounds like a natural fit, but Walter's ego will get out of hand again and will need to be top dog. But, he's not going to kill people just for a point like Don Elaido did.

I see Walt on the run for half the remaining episodes at the same time building a significant underground operation.

Skyler will go along with it and the way Jr. got excited about Walt's gambling, if he discovers his dad is a meth operator, he might really think that's cool. Then, there's Hank. Mike was a good cop who turned. Can they turn Hank in 16 episodes?